Science - USA (2021-07-09)

168 9 JULY 2021 • VOL 373 ISSUE 6551 sciencemag.org SCIENCE

M

ichael Pollan’s This Is Your Mind on

Plants combines the author’s long-

held interest in the natural world

with his growing fascination with

the workings of the human mind.

In the book, he investigates three

plant-derived compounds with vastly differ-

ent stories and effects on human conscious-

ness: the sedative opium, the stimulant

caffeine, and the hallucinogen mescaline.

Pollan weaves together three separately

engaging stories in a pleasantly meander-

ing style, deftly using his personal experi-

ences with each compound as a jumping-off

point for small forays into anthropology, his-

tory, politics, psychology, molecular biology,

and neuroscience. Even the most distracted

reader will come away with an understanding

of the physical effects of the spotlighted sub-

stances as well as their cultural significance. 

Pollan’s own garden plays a central role

in the book’s first section, where readers

learn that he (like many other gardeners)

has grown opium poppies. For Pollan, grow-

ing the gorgeous blooms inspired his current

quest to learn more about medicinal plants.

The book’s opium chapter is both a tell-

ing and a retelling. From 1996 to 1997, Pol-

lan worked on an article about growing the

illicit flower that was eventually published in

Harper’s Magazine. Potentially incriminating

details, including Pollan’s recipe for poppy

particular compound, which has long played

a vital role in Indigenous American cultures.

Pollan details numerous interactions with

individuals from Native American tribes who

are working to preserve the slow-growing

peyote plant—which he also acquires during

the course of his research—from which mes-

caline is extracted for religious rituals. Such

interactions lead him to contemplate his

own mission. “This puts the eating of peyote

by white people in a long line of nonmeta-

phorical takings from Native Americans,” he

writes. “I was beginning to see that, for some-

one like me, the act of not ingesting peyote

may be the more important one.”

Pollan goes on to describe his experiments

with non–peyote-derived mescaline. He re-

ports feeling like “a helpless captive of the

present moment.” And, although

at one point he “felt as though

things could easily tip over into

terror,” the sensation subsided

enough to allow him to enjoy the

remaining hours of intoxication.

In the end, the introspective

reader is left with more questions

than answers—“what exactly is

a drug?” for example, a question

Pollan poses in the book’s first

paragraph but fails to answer sat-

isfactorily. Why do we demonize

the use of some plant compounds and accept

others? And why do we humans seek to alter

our consciousness in the first place?

Pollan has crafted a narrative that he hopes

will influence the stories we tell about plants,

their active molecules, and the relationship

we have with them as individuals and as a

society. But this tome is not a self-help book.

Instead of prescribing a list of potential pol-

icy actions, he ultimately leaves the details

of how we might move forward with plant-

derived compounds open to interpretation. j

10.1126/science.abi7773

Although the practice falls into a legal gray area,

opium poppies are grown by many gardeners.

The reviewer is a freelance science communicator

and host of the podcast This Week in Science.

Email: [email protected]

Medicinal plants, in context

HEALTH AND MEDICINE

BOOKS et al.

By Kiki Sanford tea, were left out, however, for legal reasons.

This Is Your Mind on Plants contains the un-

redacted article and includes a discussion of

America’s opiate addiction epidemic, inter-

stitial explanations, and Pollan’s present-day

reflections on the experience.

Did deleting some of the story’s details

protect Pollan from litigation? He has no way

of knowing, but returning to it now leads him

to reflect that “whatever the DEA was think-

ing in 1996 and ’97, the government missed

the real story about opium, as in fact did I.”

The section of the book that

deals with caffeine describes Pol-

lan’s struggle to go without the

stimulant for several months.

Many who drink coffee or tea

for its reliable jolt of energy will

understand the difficulty inher-

ent in that endeavor. “The day’s

first cup of tea or coffee acquires

most of its power—its joy!—not

so much from its euphoric and

stimulating properties than from

the fact that it is suppressing the

emerging symptoms of withdrawal,” he notes.

The rest of this chapter drifts like an un-

focused (uncaffeinated?) mind between Pol-

lan’s personal musings and fascinating tales

from the colonialist history of England, as he

relates his thesis that caffeine—for better or

worse—made capitalism what it is today.

The final section of the book details Pol-

lan’s interest in mescaline, another com-

pound produced in his garden in the form

of a San Pedro cactus. Here, he takes great

care with his subject, as he ponders the issue

of cultural appropriation with respect to this

This Is Your Mind

on Plants

Michael Pollan

Penguin, 2021. 288 pp.

PHOTO: TTSTUDIO/SHUTTERSTOCK

A journalist’s meandering meditation probes a trio

of mind-altering natural compounds

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